Thursday, August 17, 2006

Funny animals, zombie crowds

I'm out of practice as a designer even though it's kind of what I used to exclusively do. So I'm trying to get inspired by other designers I like- Grim Natwick, Milt Gross, Bob Clampett, Jim Tyer and Katie Rice.

Actually, looking at Katie's designs is quite daunting.

It's so easy for an animation cartoonist to fall into a rut and start repeating the same old shapes and designs over and over again and then I see Katie inventing new ones every week and whole new styles..well it's pretty scary to try to compete with that, but I'm gonna try really hard to get some new styles or at least styles I'm not familiar with. I especially want to get as cartoony as I can, and writing all these articles about cartooniness is making me think about it all the time.

Wow! - John these is so much godammn fun bursting through in these drawings.

I see a nice blending of all of those artists you mentioned, but most heavily a fusion of early Fleischer and Milt Gross in most of these sketches. And you must totally have Katie on the brain since those rabbits are all unmistakeably based on her unique and appealing appearance.

While I definitely get a lot of great insight and info out of your "other" types of posts, I must say that It has been far too long since you posted some of your drawings.

I can't imagine YOU being "rusty" when it comes to design and it definitely doesn't seem to be a problem here in my eyes. So anyway...keep at it ya slouch and post some more brilliant scribbles real soon.

There are some really nice drawing here John - I always love to look at your loose rough drawings rather than the finished clean up and colour - so much life the in line and shapes!

The Hippo is really cool, and the crowd with the monkey on top is really nice. Love all the characters eyes, reminds me of Jim Tyer crazy eyes - they make the characters look really cartoony, full of movement even though it so only a still.

Brilliantly inventive drawings, especially that crowd shot with monkey, hippo, etc. The characters remind me both of Fleischers and Tyer, and yet they look really fresh and original. Can't wait to see them animated!

>> Actually, looking at Katie's designs is quite daunting. <<

Last week I tried to analyze and re-draw some of her characters, perhaps to understand better what she's doing, and it gave me even more appreciation for her designs. I took the drawings she posted in her blog several months ago (the post about the "mouth theory"), tried to copy them myself, and it really blew my mind. They look simple, natural and spontaneous at first look, and yet these are amazingly complex designs with such unique shapes and so much things going on in every drawing. Katie is a genius... and now she's a cartoon character too :-)I love that rabbit in pictures no.4 and 5. Will you also transform Marlo into a cartoon character? Anyway, fantastic work.

I know exactly how you feel. I'm currently in a rut, and it sucks to see everyone else comming up with great new designs all the time. Just keep looking at other people's work, and keep plugging away. I really like the blatant cartooniness of these drawings.

I love how you've mixed a bunch of cartoon styles together for these characters! Looking over them I can see the clampett influence, the early 30s influence, and the katie influence mixed so clearly and congruently!

These are lovely John, I dig the dragons… dragons get a bad press, they’re often drawn so cheesy and humourless, I want more funny dragons in my life.

I recognise the phenomenon of talking about ideal theories of drawing being so much easier than living up to the words… Words are tricky little buggers! So seductive and distracting from the good stuff… But they can also help to lead you there.

I’m glad that you articulate yourself so well here and help to repair the unpleasant gap between the snotty dry canon of writing about cartoons and the immediately joyful experience people have of cartoons themselves. It’s important that there is someone willing to articulate this stuff from the position of visual understanding… of craft-based expertise, hand and eye stuff.

I find there’s a balance to be struck between written thoughts helping to clarify where I need to go, and the actual work itself being vital and dynamic enough to move beyond the rigours of theory… (Sorry for my fancypants UK English spelling)

Blogging is a very particular experience, there aren’t precedents for it, it has a very particular psychological effect… we’re all pioneers in this territory, kind of.

You must have a far greater awareness than I do of where ‘repetition’ comes from when you draw, being so intimately familiar with the styles of other cartoonists… I’m in awe of all these spheres of visual intelligence that are still quite new to me. I feel I’ve got a lot less good stuff mediating between me and naked nature.

Theories are fine and dandy but I kind of feel like I’m venturing into weird word-resistant territory when I pick up a pencil, where I’m kind of a retard still. Groping about for solutions... maybe there’s always a bit of that.

Talking about myself to make sense of your blog... again... sorry about that.

You must have been really stoked when you drew these, John, it looks like the stuff by a younger person. Keep surrounding yourself with young talented girls, it's definitely rubbing off! The hormones loves the bunnies (I wanna pet the bunny!), the ducky looks very Katie R., where'd the dragon come from, that's very cool and different. Much much better than Freleng's dragon from Knighty Knight Bugs.

That animal group picture is certainly 'da poo', in the greatest way possible. You mention a lot of inspirations, but I wonder, what about R. Crumb, a man who seems to have always revelled in the pure idea of hideous 'cartoony' motion. Fun.